NSF grant award to help fund SPARK scholarship program

By Kristina Kenney University News Service October 29, 2012

The College of Science and Engineering at Texas State University has been awarded a National Science Foundation grant to help fund SPARK, a scholarship program for women entering the university to study science, technology, engineering or mathematics.

Beginning in the fall of 2013, 18 scholarships of $10,000 each will be awarded to first-year female college students with financial need who plan to earn a degree in a STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) field. The NSF grant, worth $600,000, will help fund the program’s goal of “sparking” girls’ interest in these fields and support their successes as new college students.

Eligible applicants must be incoming freshmen or current first-year students at Texas State and declare a major in engineering, computer science, engineering technology or mathematics. They must also be eligible for financial aid, be enrolled full time at the university, have at least three years of science courses, have taken mathematics courses through pre-calculus, rank in the top 25 percent of their high school graduating class, have at least a “B” average in both math and sciences courses and satisfy the College Readiness Benchmarks on the SAT or ACT assessment tests.

For more information about the SPARK program or to apply, please visit www.cose.txstate.edu/spark.html, or contact Susan Romanella at sr23@txstate.edu.